A Drastic Way to Become Unstuck
As the book opens, Patrick “Kick” Kilpatrick, age 33, finds himself immersed in the Gulf of Mexico as his cruise ship, the Carnival Valor, sails away. It is 11:45 PM on November 27th. He and his family are on Thanksgiving vacation, and nobody knows he has disappeared. The family has gone to bed for the night.
If you are wondering how Kick got himself into this predicament, so is he. Did he fall? Did someone push him? Did he jump? He even wonders if he is fulfilling the prophecy of his full name, has Patrick killed Patrick?
The story unfolds one hour at a time over twenty-two hours and chapters. Though Kick recalls his life as he hopes for rescue, for all intents and purposes, the book has only one character and one scene – Kick afloat in the Gulf of Mexico.
It seems daunting for an author to write such a tale. While the Gulf of Mexico is a wide-open expanse, the inside of one character’s head could be claustrophobic.
Also daunting was the research the author did to write the book. In an interview, she tells us she had to answer questions such as these:
- How long could someone survive in the Gulf in November?
- What does it mean to be in salt water, dehydrated, hypothermic, and hallucinating?
- Are there shipping lanes? And what are the odds of being seen?
- What about other creatures in the water?
Kick has a survival mantra he utters in each chapter: “Within the next hour, somebody’s going to rescue me.” Meanwhile, the author gives us background info that allows us to hope he stands a chance. There are many things to know about Kick such as:
- He was a Nebraska state champion in the five-hundred-meter freestyle.
- Beyond being a former champion swimmer, he is a physical therapist by day and a fitness instructor and personal trainer by night.
- He knows lots about the body. Such as he is currently 16 percent body fat. He has been trying to get this down to 12% but is glad he has not succeeded. This gives him hope “because every greasy fat cell stands to help him not freeze.”
- He is a fan of Reader’s Digest’s “Drama in Real Life” stories from which he has learned how others have gotten in and out of extreme predicaments.
- And he has been trained as a swimmer – and as a student of life – by his uncle Sean, an ex-navy man with the saying, HOLD FAST, tattooed across his knuckles.
As Kick continues to tread water, he looks back over his life, noting two places where he has been stuck. First and foremost is the topic of his mother who has been gone since he was eleven. And second is his girlfriend, Justeen.
In the interview, the author tells us this stuck-ness is the point of the book: “I have the joke that the whale shark makes about how men really will do anything to avoid therapy. But I did want to have a character who had become stuck, and to suddenly have to become unstuck so profoundly that he went from being completely clenched to absolutely adrift.” Her goal was to see what the experience would unlock.
You will want to read the book to see if he gets unstuck. And to see if he gets rescued. And to see if you get claustrophobic inside his head within the 208 pages of the book.
This much is a guarantee: Readers will enjoy the book’s humor as in this assessment by Kick: “When you’re in a stuck place, how do you get unstuck? I’m unstuck here – I have to give myself that – although clearly one could argue I’ve overcorrected…”
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I have read another book by Kathleen Rooney. It is vastly different from this one. Cher Ami and Major Whittlesey is historical fiction about the “Lost Battalion” in World War I. It is told in two different voices, alternating with each chapter. The first voice is Cher Ami, a carrier pigeon. The second is Major Whittlesey, the commander of the battalion.
Read my review here. It was fascinating.
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Click here to learn more about Like Mother, Like Mother on Amazon.
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If you like my writing, I hope you will check out my new book, Chai on Life. It contains 36 slice-of-life stories ranging in topics from belly fat to Billy Joel. It is available wherever books are sold and on Amazon. There is even a companion journal for you to write the stories of your life.
Chai on Life is available in 3 formats: Hard Back, Kindle, and AudioBook.
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And one last thing! Amazon has named me an Influencer (!!!!) and invited me to open a Storefront. You will find lots of my favorite things there including fun gifts for people who love to read. Check it out!
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